wish pet stores knew more bout chins

[mustangchins]

Well we rescued another chin today ...i saw him in the pet store and he was in a fish tank on a shelf thing with a light bar above his cage..only air vent was on top by light..his tail was coated in urine and his belly and paws ...it broke my heart so i gave the pet store what they was asking for him which was 50.00 and took him home i used a wet washrag with a little bit of baby soap on it to wipe clean his tail and belly and have been cuddling with him off and on..will introduce him to the 3 other boys in 30 days i hope he does well with them...i dont understand how a place can sell a chin and not have a clue to how to take care of them..i told the girl that runs the pet store that he cant be caged up like that and she told me that they didnt know much bout chins..well there are books out there that u even sell about them maybe they should use the xmas holiday to read up on animals they sell..he is like nut nut a mosiac and we named him pooh-bear...will keep u up on how he is doing...

 

[shubbles]

i totally agree. It really makes me sad seeing them in a cage with no shelves only 2 houses.i can't just buy them though. first of all our pet store prices them way to high. 150 dollars for a standard. I feel so bad for them. i wish you could ban pet stores from selling chinchillas.

 

[Bostongirl'sChin75]

I know how you feel. I was at the pet store the other day and saw to beigies in their cage and one was so bored he was sitting on top of his water bottle and the other one was sleeping inside this ball thing with a couple of holes cut into it. Not to mention the food bowl had bedding in it, as well. No toys, no chew things, except some tired looking hay. If I could have, I would have taken them both home that night,but I don't have a cage big enough for them right now. But if they are still there in a few weeks, I may go back and take them both home.

God bless you though for taking Poo Bear out of that situation though!

 

[shubbles]

someone should start a pet store rescuer rescue.

 

[Ash]

Unfortunately, as much as it doesn't seem it, when you buy from a petstore, you aren't rescuing the chins. You are contributing to their market, and providing the place for another animal to come in for them to treat the exact same way. YOU may see it as a "rescue" but it's not.

 

[shubbles]

Well you sort of are. When at a pet store the animal has very little love, very little toys, and some important things to make a chinchilla happy are missing, They're foods are probably junk and if you watch them they just sit there, expected at day, but at night... If you were to take them home you would give them all these things, get them healthy and then either keep them or sell them. Yes the pet store would make money which is unfair because they really don't give any effort to take care of a truly exotic animal.

 

[Ash]

You're not 'rescuing' them, because when you buy that chinchilla, the store sees it as a sellable item and replaces it with more chinchillas. Also, when you "rescue" something, you don't profit the other party. Ask any breeder or rescuer on here, and they'll tell you the same thing. Buying a chinchilla from a pet store, no matter how bad its setup may be, and it's exactly that, buying it.

 

[Luci]

ash brings up something i constantly struggle with.

i know pet stores can be horrible at taking care of certain pets and purchasing from them only contributes to "puppymills" and "chin mills" (for lack of better word).

i understand the way supply and demand works, but when i look at the overall picture, that animal doesnt deserve those conditions. how can someone just walk away from saving a specific chin from those conditions just under the premise of "well they'll just be replaced". i guess the way i see things is "well regardless, that animal shouldnt suffer not being homed just because he is at a pet store". get what im saying?

but i definitely understand not supporting pet stores who sell them, but thinking about the animal's life, its just hard to say who gets a home and who doesnt. so in a way, for that specific animal, it is a rescue.

i dunno, some stores just need to step up in how they care for their animals. and we cant just stigmatize all pet stores. some people truly do care. i had a friend who worked at petsmart and she checked on the health of each animal, even little hamsters. it just depends on management. and how can these stores get animals of which they know nothing? thats the problem, not so much chins in pet stores.

well...and uneducated pet buyers.

 

[Luci]

something else to think about...

which breeders sell to pet stores? maybe there could be some way to prevent chins from being sold in pet stores. that would mean that all owners will eventually have to buy from the breeders themselves and thus obtain proper care information.

ahh IF ONLY!

but since this isnt a perfect world, pets (not just chins) will always be a source of revenue.

 

[shubbles]

i guess ash you do bring up a good point. Its pretty much a stalemate. Let a chinchilla suffer but not have any more suffer or buy one chinchilla, save it, and another one suffer. I don't work at a pet store so i don't know how many chinchillas they get, but at my pet store i see the same ones in there all the time. So maybe they really aren't doing very well in the chin department. Also having people pay 150 means that they must be pretty expensive to buy from the breeder, im not sure though. Really breeders should look into who theyre selling their chinchillas to. If they know they are selling them to an inexperienced, cruel pet store they shouldn't even let people buy their chins. Same thing with inexperienced pet owners, but really it may be all about money for some breeders.
Luci thats weird i type this and then when i post i see you said the same thing. there really should be a way to stop the wrath of pet stores.

 

[chinchillalover0927]

ash brings up something i constantly struggle with.

i know pet stores can be horrible at taking care of certain pets and purchasing from them only contributes to "puppymills" and "chin mills" (for lack of better word).

i understand the way supply and demand works, but when i look at the overall picture, that animal doesnt deserve those conditions. how can someone just walk away from saving a specific chin from those conditions just under the premise of "well they'll just be replaced". i guess the way i see things is "well regardless, that animal shouldnt suffer not being homed just because he is at a pet store". get what im saying?

but i definitely understand not supporting pet stores who sell them, but thinking about the animal's life, its just hard to say who gets a home and who doesnt. so in a way, for that specific animal, it is a rescue.

i dunno, some stores just need to step up in how they care for their animals. and we cant just stigmatize all pet stores. some people truly do care. i had a friend who worked at petsmart and she checked on the health of each animal, even little hamsters. it just depends on management. and how can these stores get animals of which they know nothing? thats the problem, not so much chins in pet stores.

well...and uneducated pet buyers.

thats how i feel, thats why we have bought from pet stores before.......cupcake was in a fish tank maybe a 5 gallon with a bowl of dust bath and shavings................

 

[Tillygizmo]

If it helps at all, my new idea was to go to the pet store where they have chins bored and buy them something for the store to put in there for them. This is just my way of helping as little as it may be

 

[Ruby]

I just don't go to pet stores, I now order everything online from ranchers who know what they are doing. I would be too tempted to "rescue" a chinchilla from a horrible environment in a pet store but it just, as Ash said, motivates the pet store to buy another one.

 

[mustangchins]

wow..i didnt think this "rescue" would stir up so much..well i saw it as a rescue..cause he needed a home and the 50.00 well was just something to shut them up..and i did tell the store owner not to be housing them in the fish tanks..i gave her an update on how to take care of them for future ..and told her i would be more then happy to come in and help volunteer wise..and she was so happy and said she would..but the owner came in and dropped him off..instead of finding him a home to begin with..that made me mad..but all in all he is at a home that loves him and will take care of him correctly and has buddies in a month he will join in with and have play dates with..i thought i was doing a good thing by giving him a good home but i see some ppl dont think that and i am sorry for that..to all of my chin friends ..merry christmas from poof, peanut, peechu and now pooh bear..

 

[Ruby]

wow..i didnt think this "rescue" would stir up so much..well i saw it as a rescue..cause he needed a home and the 50.00 well was just something to shut them up..and i did tell the store owner not to be housing them in the fish tanks..i gave her an update on how to take care of them for future ..and told her i would be more then happy to come in and help volunteer wise..and she was so happy and said she would..but the owner came in and dropped him off..instead of finding him a home to begin with..that made me mad..but all in all he is at a home that loves him and will take care of him correctly and has buddies in a month he will join in with and have play dates with..i thought i was doing a good thing by giving him a good home but i see some ppl dont think that and i am sorry for that..to all of my chin friends ..merry christmas from poof, peanut, peechu and now pooh bear..

I did not mean that you should not have rescued him, just that I in general try to stay away for that reason, that I would rescue them myself.

 

[Ash]

Also having people pay 150 means that they must be pretty expensive to buy from the breeder, im not sure though.

Not true. I used to work at a pet store. They'd pay $35 for a cockatiel and sell it for $120

 

[mustangchins]

then what would u call it....if i am not using the correct terminology then please correct me i dont want to offend ppl in here using the wrong terms..

 

[addictedtochins]

Mustang, Ash is mostly right. And the whole purpose of this forum is to be a place to learn. So it's good you posted about Pooh Bear, and it's good Ash posted her answer. This subject has been covered many times before, most subjects have, but new people come here every day. Now, I say you can both be right on this subject depending on the situation. In your case Mustang I do believe Pooh was rescued because he was surrendered to the store. Hopefully the store does not regularly carry chins and will not place an order for chins from a place like this Texas (or any) exotic wholesaler. Now when you buy from Petco, Petsmart and even the local store, anyplace that does order shipments of chins whether from breeders or wholesalers you are just adding to the problem because even if they come from a breeder, unless you have seen first hand the chin barn you don't know if they are being kept as they should.

 

[mustangchins]

no this pet store usually does not deal in chins...first one i have seen in there for long time since new owner took over..old owner knew how to care for them but this one didnt and was more then happy to learn ..i plan on donating some of my cages to them so they have a chin home for them if they get any more ..she also took my name and number in case another one would be dropped off and same for our humane society they have me if needed..it just made me mad to know i was being knocked by using the word rescue..its my word i used and to me it was a rescue..

 

[MelodyR]

Okay, I can't keep silent any longer ---

I may get blasted for this but as far as I am concerned, you DID rescue that chin. If you had not, it could likely have died or been purchased on whim by someone else who had no idea what they were doing and could not have cared less. For THAT chin you ARE its rescue. And it would have been "replaced" by the petshop eventually anyway. They make the majority of their profits off the "stuff" they sell to go with the animal anyway, not the critter itself.

I get upset by criticism from people who say you should have left it "to teach the pet shop a lesson." Tell that to the chin. If some dimwit had purchased it, tortured or mistreated it a bit more and then surrendered it to a rescue -- THEN it would have been okay for you to adopt it???????? Only THEN did you rescue it?????

I applaud you for what you did because you not only gave that chin a new beginning, you also took the time to educate the pet shop, and countless others -- you put your actions where your heart is. You didn't just preach, you acted on your beliefs.

BTW, I have also "rescued" from pet shops, and I actively run a rescue myself. I would never be so self-righteous as to proclaim that what I do is any better than what you have done. I have close to ninety critters in my care right now, living the perfect life for their species. Some are mine, some are rescues who are also mine if I cannot find them a forever home. I have taken them in from kill shelters and from other rescues who are over-capacity.

Human idiots come in all forms -- can you believe there are tiny mice and hamsters at the SPCA because the owners move and no longer "have enough room" for them?

The maturity, compassion and love you have demonstrated should be commended, not condemned. Some day, that little chinnie will be waiting for you on the other side of the Rainbow Bridge and let you know exactly how much they appreciated what you did for them, the littlest of His creatures!

Keep up the good work, and give that chin the best life you can!!!!!